Houston TV Station Gives Out Twitter Feed Of Man Thought To Be Rapist

HOUSTON (CBS Houston) — A Houston television station committed a huge gaffe by mistakenly using the Twitter feed of a man who they thought was a convicted rapist.

According to CNET, KHOU-TV included the Twitter feed of @abrahamjoseph in a story published Monday about ex-Houston police officer Abraham Joseph, who was convicted of raping a waitress in his patrol car.

However, the account they linked to is that of Abraham Riesman, a New York producer and journalist.

“Hey @KHOU – I’m not a convicted rapist! Please take my Twitter feed down from this article,” Riesman tweeted.

Riesman told BetaBeat that it was an example of “old media folks” who fell on their faces trying to understand new media.

“Basic logic dictates that there is no way this is [the real Abraham Joseph’s] Twitter feed,” Riesman explained to the website. “For one: look at my avatar. It’s a really white, red-headed gentleman with glasses and the fact that this is a TV station would convey they have some visual sense of what this convicted rapist would look like. Also, how would I be tweeting? And perhaps even more importantly: why would I be tweeting at midnight about ‘Homeland’?”